


You, Me, and Folie à Deux

by Jubalii



Category: Hellsing, Hellsing: Ultimate
Genre: Enemies to Friends, Escape, F/M, Gen, Hostage Situations, Interrogation, Threats of Violence
Language: English
Status: In-Progress
Published: 2016-03-20
Updated: 2016-10-06
Packaged: 2018-05-27 19:58:45
Rating: Mature
Warnings: Graphic Depictions Of Violence
Chapters: 4
Words: 10,755
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/6298183
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/Jubalii/pseuds/Jubalii
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>Captured, degraded, and forced into interrogations about her life and world, Integra Hellsing has only one thing on her mind: escape. But in this strange white-walled palace of psychological torture and roundabout questions, there is no Alucard to fight for her, no Seras to help her, and no Walter to save her. The only other person beside her questioner is Paladin Anderson who, due to his enhanced physical capabilities, faces physical pain far worse than any she receives. Between the two of them, surely they can escape... right?</p>
            </blockquote>





	1. Mr. Wayne, the Flannel Terror

            Integra Hellsing went to bed in her bedroom at Hellsing on a completely normal night, and woke to gray metal walls the next time she opened her eyes. She sat up, looking around blearily. Then, realizing that something _wasn’t_ right, she rubbed her eyes and looked around again, only to find out that she wasn’t wearing her glasses. The world was blurry, and she was forced to squint at the nondescript gray walls; steel studs were the only decorations, if you could call them that.

            There were only three pieces of furniture in the room. There was the metal table she was seated at, the icy metal chair she was seated _in_ , and an uninhabited metal chair directly across from her. She tried to push her chair back from the table in order to stand, but found to her astonishment that it was bolted to the floor. A quick examination proved that the table, and presumably the other chair, was bolted to the floor as well.

            Looking up at the ceiling, she saw that it was made of smooth poured concrete, the same as the floor beneath her bare feet _._ The lights in the room came from fluorescent bulbs behind sheets of glass or plastic—there was no way of climbing up there to check, and without her glasses she could barely make out specifics. The panes were deeply set into the concrete; it was clear that the builders had set the bulbs and their protective casings into the concrete itself, and then poured more over it to make sure that no one could remove the face. She wondered briefly how they managed to change the light bulbs.

            She remained seated at the metal table, crossing her arms. She was chilly, sitting in this entirely metal room with only a nightgown between her skin and the cold steel. Granted, the gown had long sleeves and it fell to her ankles, but the fabric was thin and it was made for humid summer nights, not icy metal rooms. She was cold-natured as it was, anyway.

            It was clear to her that she’d been kidnapped, although how or why escaped her. It had to have been an inside job, but even so—how did her captor sneak past Alucard and Walter? The two men had never failed her before. Who wanted her so badly that they’d risk the ancient vampire’s wrath to get to her? And, how did she not wake up between her bedroom and here, as light a sleeper as she was? Had she been drugged, or did her captors have a grasp of magic? As many questions as she had, she couldn’t think of a single answer.

            She wished she had her glasses. She wished she had a dressing gown to slip into. Or at least some socks. She frowned, deciding that she’d been in this place long enough. It was time to call Alucard to come get her. She’d get some answers from the people she found, and then she’d let her vampire rip them to shreds for daring to steal her from her bed and drag her out to God-knows-where.

            She called out to Alucard through their master-servant bond, fully expecting a reply. When three or four seconds passed without him checking in, she called him again, growing agitated. Where was he? He still didn’t check in, and she realized with a start that she hadn’t really felt anything from him since she woke. How long had it been now, fifteen minutes? Thirty? Or maybe only ten?

            Now she really _was_ getting agitated. She planned to go and check the door next, once she managed to slide out from behind the bolted chair. It would be stupid of her to be sitting here, with the door to the room open the entire time. But before she could even move towards the door, she heard a lock tumbler clicking and it opened.

            A man stepped in, glancing at her before immediately turning and shutting the metal door behind him; she heard the lock fall back into place, but he wisely tested it by pushing against it with his hand. The door, on this side of the room at least, had no keyhole or locking mechanism. Why had this man locked himself in with her? Was it her captor, or just a servant? He might be in here to kill her. She immediately was on her guard, her arms tensing against her chest.

            The man was rather handsome, actually. He was very casually dressed; his blue jeans had a tear in the knee and were frayed around the hem, and his red flannel shirt was rolled up to his elbows, showing off tanned, hairy forearms. He wore shoddy boots that were clearly very old; a gold wedding band glinted on one finger. She noted that he was missing the second finger of his right hand, severed cleanly at the knuckle.

His brown hair was slightly mussed, as if he’d been running his hands through it. He had a five o’clock shadow, and he scratched his stubbly neck as he slid into the seat opposite her. He beamed at her, his smile two gleaming rows of straight white teeth. His eyes were nearly the same shade as hers, and they stared piercingly into her own. For a moment, they silently sized each other up. The man relaxed in his chair, tilting his head slightly as he chuckled, breaking the tension with the easygoing sound.

“Well, well,” he drawled. “Integra Fairbrook Wingates Hellsing. What an honor it is.” He spoke with American Southern accent, his dialect drawing out his words until Hellsing became “Hail-sin’” and honor became “on-er”. Integra gave him her best glare, the one usually reserved for getting her way with the Round Table Knights.

“Where am I?” she spat ferociously. They didn’t call her “Ice Queen” for nothing. _This is ridiculous. Why can’t I call Alucard? What’s going on? I don’t even know how long I was unconscious. What if it’s been days?_ She tried to keep such thoughts at bay and focused instead on the man smiling pleasantly at her from across the table.

“At the moment, you’re in my interrogation room.” He paused, lips thinning as he pressed them together. “It gets chilly in here,” he said with concern in his tone, brow knitting. “Can I get you a blanket, or maybe some hot coffee?”

“What you can _get_ me is answers.” His smile looked frozen for a moment, but he chuckled again and waved in the air, as though the gesture were dispersing her words.

“Calm down there, little lady,” he laughed. “Believe you me: there’ll be more than enough answers in this place to do us both.” She gritted her teeth, hands fisting at his light tone.

“I’ll give you one chance to be a proper gentleman. Point me in the direction of the nearest exit. I’m ready to go home.” He laughed again, covering his mouth as he stared jovially at her.

“Ain’t nobody ever got out of this place… alive, that is,” he informed her. “Even I’ll be shot in the back of the head one day; I know too much.”

“Who _are_ you?” she asked, narrowing her eyes. His smile was beginning to get on her nerves. He leaned back in the chair, and she could tell that he was crossing his legs beneath the table. He crossed his arms as well, mimicking her position, and gazed down his nose at her.

“I’m the guy that’s gonna kill you.” He scratched said nose, letting the sentence sink in for a moment before continuing. “But my name’s Wayne Grady. My folks call me Little Wayne, but you can call me Mr. Wayne, if you please.”

“Little Wayne,” Integra repeated incredulously, a hint of revulsion in her voice. Was this man serious? He was treating this as if it were a mere friendly conversation, instead of a talk between a hostage and her supposed future killer. His voice was beginning to grate on her nerves with its careless nature. Perhaps he enjoyed being in charge, but she was ready to take some control of her own.

“Yes, ma’am,” he nodded. “Born and bred in Georgia, in the good ol’ U-S of A. I’m a fan of the Braves and the Packers. My home has a shrine to Kyle Busch.” _Packers? Kyle Busch?_ This man… it sounded almost like he was speaking a second language. Integra had no idea what he meant, or who he was referring to.

“Why am I here, Mr. Grady?” she finally asked, shaking her head to clear it. “Surely you wouldn’t have me here if it didn’t serve some ulterior motive of yours.” Wayne shook his head, pursing his lips.

“Not me, ma’am,” he corrected. “My boss. I’m just the interrogator, jailer, and executioner. Another hardworking Joe making a quick buck, that’s all. My boss is the one that asks for the answers; it’s just my job to give him what he wants.”

“Who is your boss? What does _he_ want with me, then?”

“My boss is not your concern right now, I’m afraid,” he replied cordially. “You’ve got bigger problems. And he wants answers, just like I said. And I’ll get them.” He leaned back further in the metal chair, as far as he could with the thing bolted to the floor. “You see, you’re in quite the predicament, Miss Hellsing. It ain’t a question of “Will I die?” for you. That’s a fragment of a question. It’s better to say “ _When_ will I die?” or maybe “ _How_ will I die?”. That’s more specific. “Who’s gonna kill me” is a pretty silly question, since you’re looking at him, but sometimes silly questions are acceptable, too.”

            “I’m not asking any of those things, because I will _not_ die.”

            “Suit yourself,” he shrugged. “In that case, I’ll just hop on into what I came in here for. Normally, we just put you straight in your cell, but I wanted to have a chance to lay the ground rules with you. I ain’t had a chance to read over your file yet, but I can tell you are the kind of lady that likes to make waves in the pool. I don’t particularly care for _those_ sorts of people, but you also strike me as the kind of woman who understands the need for order.”

            “Ground rules?” she repeated quietly, seething with anger. “You dare to order _me_ around, Mr. Grady?” The man shrugged again, before leaning forwards and resting his elbows on the table.

            “You can either follow them, or not. I don’t care no way. But your quality of living depends on how well you behave. I ain’t gonna have no upstarts in my interrogation room. I ain’t no zookeeper. What you act like is what you become.”

            “I see,” Integra answered slowly, wishing she had her gun. This man would look a lot better with a bullet in between his eyes. The man nodded solemnly, his eyes becoming serious. He wasn’t laughing anymore.

            “Y’all British folks are supposed to be all manners and good graces,” he said thoughtfully. “What do they call it, gen-i-al-ity? So you might be good after all. In any case, listen carefully, cause I’m only gonna say this once. I ain’t one to repeat myself; it’s a waste of time and good air.”

            “I’m listening,” Integra responded sarcastically, one brow arching. It wasn’t as effectual without her glasses, and up close the man’s features had become too blurry to see well. She couldn’t gage his reactions like she usually could. He must have seen her squinting, because he made a strange sound and fished around in the front pocket of his shirt. After a moment, he pulled something out and slid it across the table to her, the object nearly skidding off the metal surface and onto the floor. Feeling on the metal table, she realized that he had given her glasses. And not just any glasses—this shape, this form… They were _her_ glasses.

            “I forgot I had them. My men got a’holt of them when they got you, just in case you had to be reading something during interrogation. My orders was to bring everything you’d use on a daily basis,” he explained. “Them dumbasses forgot your other clothes, though.”

            “I see,” Integra said again, slipping her glasses on. Her world came into focus properly for the first time and she saw that he was older than she first thought. Now she could see fine lines and slight wrinkles on his face, and he looked more forty-five and less twenty-five. She blinked at him and he waited a second before holding up one finger.

            “Let’s start with rule number one,” he enunciated slowly. “I ask a question, you answer the question. Even if you can’t manage a “Yes, sir” or “No, sir”, and only make a sound, you still damn better answer my question. It’s rude to ignore others, and I can’t tell if you hear me or not if you ain’t answering.”

He caught her questioning glance and grinned. “Sometimes people pass out during interrogation. I gotta know if you can still hear me, otherwise I think my methods might be ineffective and I gotta get rough.”

“Rough?” Integra asked, not wanting to know the answer, but feeling that it had to be asked nonetheless. He nodded pointedly and held up a second finger.

“Yes, ma’am. That brings me on to rule _numero dos_. You get what you give.” Integra stared at him blankly and he cleared his throat. “I start you out pretty good, compared to other places. They might just give you a bucket and some hay. I got y’all a bed, toilet, three square meals a day...”he trailed off, looking pleased. “You oughta thank me for that.”

“Really?” Integra sneered. “I ought to thank you?” His gaze turned dark at the sarcasm.

“I’d change that attitude if I were you. I can give you a bucket and some hay, just like that,” he snapped his fingers. “You be nice and polite, answer my questions, don’t cause no trouble, and you can have all your little privileges.” He smiled and held up the hand that was missing a finger. “On the other hand…. Be a disrespectful little bitch, and I’ll make sure you’ll be begging to die in less than a week.”

Integra glared stonily at him. This time, his smile was frigid and his eyes glinted with a cruel light. “Do you understand me?” When she didn’t respond, the smile widened. “You aren’t stupid, Miss Hellsing. I know you remember rule number one. Now… _do you understand me_?”

“Yes, I do,” she replied, each word ground out from between her teeth. He nodded and rose, sliding out from under the table and walking to the door. He looked back at her, expression pensive.

“You know, I think I’ll stick you with that other one,” he said musingly. “I’m afraid that’s one of the downsides to small living—we don’t have enough cells for everyone to have their own. But this fella’s been solo since he got here. It’s time he had someone to talk to. They usually go insane on their own; that makes interrogating them nigh on impossible, so we try to avoid it.” He didn’t expect any reply from her, as he turned from her to the door and knocked once on the metal. The door opened with a clank and he spoke to someone on the other side of the door. Integra couldn’t see who it was; he was blocking the opening with his body, and the door was barely cracked as it was.

“We’ll put her with that mackerel snapper in Block C.” He listened to a voice answering him, his head bent low. Integra leaned forward slightly, but she was too far away to hear the individual words; it all ran together as a buzz, but it sounded masculine. She wondered if there were any females wherever she was, or if the place was populated with males only. Perhaps the only females were prisoners. And he’d spoken as if there were other prisoners…. How many? Who were they? She wondered if she’d ever see them. She also felt a small tremor of trepidation at the thought of being stuck in a cell with a stranger, but there was nothing she could do about that. She really was, as _Mr. Wayne_ said, in a predicament.

            The other person on the opposite side of the door stopped speaking and Wayne looked back at her, his brow knitting and meeting over his nose. He stared at her a long moment, his eyes distant. Then, he seemed to decide on something and turned back to whomever was on the other side of the door.

            “Even if she _does_ , what can they do? It ain’t like they can collaborate to escape or anything. She ain’t linked with that monster anymore so he can’t do his thing, neither. It’ll be fine. If anything, it might give him some incentive to _speak_.” He listened again. “Not necessarily. We can always offer to get her out of there in exchange for talking. Either way, we can make it work in our favor.” He nodded, then turned to her and inclined his head in farewell. “We’ll meet each other soon enough, Integra Hellsing. You be good now,” he added with a wink as he closed the door.

            The moment he was gone, she got out of the chair. She was fuming, furious at the demeaning way he spoke to her, and at the situation as a whole. Who the hell did he think he was?! She was Integra Hellsing, heiress! She began to pace, brain working furiously as she struggled to come up with some escape plan. When the door opened again, she might be able to overpower whoever was on the other side, but it was a gamble…. She had barely made one turn about the room before she heard something strange.

            Tilting her head, she listened to the faint hissing. By the time she realized what it was, the world spun. She became dizzy and sank to her knees, coughing before passing out cold on the hard concrete, her head thumping onto her arm as she hit the ground.


	2. The Enemy of My Enemy is... A Familiar Face

Integra woke again, this time to a world of white.

She winced, her head still feeling swimmy. _Damn them, they gassed me!_ She closed her eyes again and lay there for a moment, trying to get her bearings. She felt something soft beneath her head, cushioning her arm and cheek. Something warm and heavy had been draped over her; a blanket, no doubt.

This room was warmer than the interrogation room had been. If she had to guess, the cold air was part of the uncomfortable interrogation, and this room was merely her cell. She supposed that warm air was part of the “privileges” that Wayne Grady had spoken to her about. She tried to think back to what else he had said.

Her thoughts felt as though they had weight, buoying her down and making her wish she had been able to stay unconscious longer. She felt as though she could sleep for hours. Her mind was wavering like the face of a pond, disturbed by ripples. She couldn’t get ahold of a single thought long enough to consider it before it was borne away by another. _A side-effect of the gas, I assume._

 _Crinkle, rustle….crunch, crunch, crunch, gulp._ That sound…she frowned. Someone was eating, and very loudly at that. It was irritating to listen to. The realization swept over her that she wasn’t alone, sending a bolt of panic through her system. She forced herself to remain calm, calling out to Alucard again. There was still no answer—she was still alone in her mind.

She half-remembered something Mr. Grady had said—“she’s not linked with that monster anymore”, or something along those lines. Did that mean they’d found a way of breaking the bond between her and her servant? Was Alucard out there, running around rampant without anyone or anything to stop him? She couldn’t do anything about it if he was…she had bigger issues to deal with. She had, according to the interrogator’s orders, had been put in a cell with someone else. Someone who was already on her bad side as an annoyingly loud chewer.

She barely opened one eye, peering beneath her lashes at the room. She still wore her glasses; the way she was laid out, they were pinching the bridge of her nose and had been knocked slightly askew. But she could still see through them. What she saw was bright light and white, white everywhere.

She opened her eyes fully and focused enough to realize that what she saw was, in fact, a whitewashed wall. She turned and found herself on a bed of sorts. It was squishy and comfortable, but there were no blankets or pillows to be had. _Nothing to choke or suffocate myself with…_ she thought grimly. _They’ve taken time to think about suicide. I have to give them that—they were clever enough to think about suicide._ If the other Knights were here, they’d have chastised her. _It’s improper to congratulate one’s enemy._

She was still in her nightgown, but the heavy “blanket” turned out to be a large jacket of sorts. Opening it further, she realized that it was an… overcoat? She looked carefully at it; something about it jogged her memory, as if she’d seen it before. But Wayne Grady hadn’t been wearing an overcoat. It wasn’t threadbare, but it _was_ well-worn and patched in places by an expert hand, the stitches barely noticeable. From far away, it would have been impossible to see.

She was grateful for it, wherever it came from. It was well-insulated and warm, despite the patch job. Still, she doubled it up and laid it on the end of the bed, not wanting to wear someone else’s clothing. She wanted one of her suits, but for all she knew they’d probably force her to wear her nightgown for the entirety of her stay. All the more reason to work quickly to find a way to escape.

Looking around, she noticed the bed was off against the corner of the large room. The room was painted with the brightest shade of white imaginable: white ceiling, white walls, white floors…every piece of furniture within it was white, and even the light coming from the ceiling dazzled her eyes with a blinding glare.

She adjusted her glasses on her face and slowly looked around the room. The crunching was coming from behind her, and that was the last thing she wanted to face. Even if whoever was there didn’t have any weapons to kill her with, she still didn’t want to see them. For a moment longer, she could live in ignorant bliss.

The unknown was less frightening, and she had to admit that she _was_ beginning to feel frightened. She was alone, without her protectors Walter and Alucard, having been told that she wouldn’t escape alive from this place, and would probably be tortured for answers to questions she had no idea about. There was also anger, irrational anger at herself for falling into their trap, even though she had been asleep the entire time. She felt panic begin to blossom in her chest, and forced herself to catalogue the room in order to give her mind something to do. Otherwise, she might go mental.

There wasn’t much to catalogue, though. There was the bed, with its soft squishy nothing-ness, pushed up into the farthest corner. Adjacent from the bed, there was a countertop jutting out of the wall, reminding her strikingly of the island in the main kitchens at Hellsing. As a child, she would sit on a tall stool while her father was meeting with officials, and Cook would push her lunch across the countertop to her. Did this have something to do with her “three square meals?”

She turned her head more, looking at the wall head on now. There was the door, as nondescript and smooth as the one to the interrogation room had been. Another slight turn—an alcove built into the wall held a toilet and a small sink, and a showerhead behind a partition. An oblong piece of tin stood in for an unbreakable mirror.

Another quarter-turn revealed a metal table, it’s far end pushed against the wall. Two chairs were also there, but they had a thinly cushioned base instead of just hard steel. She looked down and saw—to her satisfaction—that they were also bolted. It would have disappointed her if they’d forgotten, just when she was beginning to give them credit for their impeccable planning.

Finally she had to twist her upper body to look behind her. She went ahead and pushed herself off of the bed, standing up and looking at what had been hidden behind her when she first woke.

She gasped involuntarily; not at the couch, which was as bland as the other furniture, upholstered with the same material as the bed. Not at the coffee table, metal and bolted, the remains of an eaten lunch on the top. But at the man sitting there, staring blankly at the whitewashed wall as he ate from the bag of crisps sitting on his lap.

“Paladin Anderson?” She had to be crazy. Crazy, or dreaming. There was no way that the Guillotine, that _Angel Dust Anderson_ was sitting on a couch in a cell, eating crisps and staring at nothing. She realized that the overcoat she’d had on _was_ familiar; she’d seen it before, on him. And he was without his outer garment. In fact, he was without a few of his layers. He was only dressed in what looked like a gray tee-shirt, his black pants, gray socks and his glasses. And none the worse for wear.

He looked over at her, his gaze revealing no surprise or confusion. He simply nodded at her in greeting.

“I was wondering when ye’d wake.” She knew that her eyes had to be the size of dinner plates. She inched towards him, eyeing him warily as she took a seat at the table.

She hadn’t heard any reports that the paladin had gone missing. Her contacts at the Vatican were silent on the matter. Enrico Maxwell hadn’t accused her of stealing him. But here he was, all the same. She sat in utter silence, the only sound the rustling of the bag, trying to wrap her mind around what had to be happening. They’d taken her, and they’d taken Anderson. Clearly, he must be a prisoner here too. Otherwise, why would he be in the room with her? Was he who Grady had meant when he said that he’d “put her with the other one”?

“A question, Hellsing.” His voice stirred her out of her thoughts.

“Yes?” she replied, too surprised to even try to be rude to him. Right now, she wasn’t worried that he was a Papist dog. She was more worried about the fact that he hadn’t escaped from this place.

“What day was it, when ye were last in the outside world?” This question made her heart sink. How long had he been here, that he didn’t even know what day it was? She thought back, trying to remember what date she’d written on the documents that day in her office. Her mind was still fuzzy from the gas, and it took her a few moments to remember.

“I believe it was the evening of August 16th,” she replied hesitantly. “How long have you been here?” His countenance was grave as he heard the date.

“I last remember it being June 29th,” he replied hoarsely, throwing down the bag with the crumbs on the platter and crossing his arms over his chest. It seemed that the news had taken away what was left of his appetite. She felt a stirring of hunger in her own stomach, but pushed it off to the side. “I’ve tried to keep up with the days by countin’ the meals, but I’m convinced they dinnae come at the same time each day,” he growled, running a hand through his hair. She noticed absently that he was missing his gloves with their trademark symbols that rivaled Alucard’s holiness, though through function she wasn’t sure. Surely his gloves didn’t hold his powers, did they? It would explain why they were gone, though.

“Were you off by a large margin?” she asked, her nose wrinkling. He nodded, looking with contempt at the door.

“Aye, but when they take ye in for questioning, ye get no meals. I could’ve been in there for days without food, and not known.” She felt a shiver ripple up her spine. He made it sound as though he were taking trips to Hell. _He’s a Regenerator_ , she recalled with sudden, horrific clarity. _Any wounds they’d make on him would be healed up within hours, if not days. That’s why he looks fine._

“Why haven’t you tried to escape? You can traverse time and space with your…” she paused for lack of a term. “Holy power.” He looked at her, and she saw his eyes were weary. He looked exhausted and near set to collapse.

“I cannae,” he admitted quietly. “Somehow they’ve managed to stop me from leaving. And I’ve tried to beat my way through the metal, but it left me with nothin’ but broken knuckles.”

“Perhaps the same thing that has broken the link between me and Alucard, is the same thing that keeps you from accessing your powers,” she mused, and her stomach growled audibly. Anderson frowned.

“Ye should’ve taken the bag when there was somethin’ left inside. Ye cannae tell when ye’ll get another meal.” She shrugged, feigning indifference.

“I can go without eating,” she assured him. “If they think they can break me by starvation, they have another thing coming.” He scoffed.

“Can ye?” he asked. “Yer nothing but skin an’ bone as it is.” He gazed at her a moment more before looking up at the concrete ceiling. He said nothing else, and seemed to be on the point of outright ignoring her. She wanted to ask him more questions, but something in her stopped the words before they spilled out.

 _The enemy of my enemy is my friend,_ she thought absently, tugging at a stray strand of bangs that kept wanting to sit right in her field of vision. _So, logically, Anderson and I should work together._ She glanced quickly at him out of the corner of her eye. _But, he’s still the Pope’s lapdog. I suppose it could be worse; he could be that groveling pig, Maxwell._

            “Does anyone know where you are?” she asked, after sitting for as long as she could in terse silence. Her voice sounded loud to her in the absence of any other source of sound, other than their breathing. He didn’t move, but she saw his eyes flit in her direction. He shrugged, but didn’t speak, and she couldn’t find a reason to say anything more. She lay her head down on her arms, hunched over the table, and closed her eyes. Her mind was still fogged and weary, and there wasn’t anything else to do but sleep, if he didn’t plan on talking.


	3. Counting Hours in the Best Way Feasible

            When she woke again, she was alone. Blinking, she looked around in surprise, wondering foolishly where Anderson might have gone. A strange, cloying scent was in the air, and she sniffed it suspiciously before realizing that it was that same gas they’d used before. But it didn’t seem to be making her tired this time… perhaps they’d only issued it to make sure she was asleep while they got Anderson. Then again, she had just woken, so perhaps she had slept the majority of it off. Looking around, she noticed that the tray he’d had earlier (how earlier?) was cleared from the coffee table as well.

            A click sounded behind her and she turned to see a similar tray slide onto the counter from a panel in the wall. A hand closed the panel, leaving the wall was as smooth and unassuming as before. She walked over curiously and peered at the wall, running a hand over the place where the panel had been; she felt no indent in the wall, or any other thing that would have suggested that it would open.

            Her stomach growled loudly, reminding her that she wasn’t certain of the last time that she ate. She looked down at the tray and saw what looked like a schoolchild’s breakfast laid out on the plastic for her: a carton of milk, a square slab of powdered eggs, a thin slice of toast with a pat of margarine already applied, a pre-peeled orange cut into fourths, and a small packet of jam. The side of the tray held a metal spoon and a napkin, but no fork or knife.

            It wasn’t her usual breakfast fare, but she was too hungry to care at this point. She carried it back to the table, ignoring the protesting muscles of her back and neck. She’d slept in an uncomfortable position on the table, it seemed. _You’d think I’d be used to it, falling asleep at my desk all the time_ , she thought wryly as she sat down and said a quick prayer (that was more a bid for freedom than thanks for a meal received) over the food before digging in.

            The eggs needed a little salt, but otherwise she couldn’t complain about the meal. She finished, wiped the crumbs from the table onto the tray, and for lack of a better solution she returned the tray to the countertop.

Then she moved to the small “bathroom” and washed her hands, splashing some freezing water onto her face and looking thoughtfully at the shower before deciding that now would be as good a time as any, seeing as no one was in the room. But she had no clue if they were watching with cameras…. She sighed, ultimately deciding against it and wishing instead that she had a toothbrush. She settled for washing her mouth out with water and then sat on the couch.

It didn’t take long for her to be utterly bored beyond comparison. She pondered for a while, but every time she tried to think of an escape plan her thoughts headed in darker directions, doing nothing to help ease the fear beating at the back of her mind. She stood and began to pace, trying her best to ignore the panic and instead focus on the white.

It didn’t take long for her to find a nook in her mind that she could crawl into. She wandered the cell aimlessly, her mind utterly blank. She thought of nothing. She saw nothing but white. She noticed nothing, other than the dull ache in her legs as she completed lap after lap. It was as if she had found another plane of existence and had simply ceased to _be_ on this earthly realm.

* * *

Twelve meals. She had been alone for twelve meals. By Grady’s three-meals-a-day standard, she had been here for four days already. Were they really interrogating Anderson that long? How did he manage not to go crazy?

She felt like she _was_ going crazy. No human contact for twelve meals…. No, four days. No one measured time by meals. That was what _crazy_ people did. She wasn’t a lunatic. But she felt like it, sometimes. Her days were nothing but fifteen minutes of conscious eating per meal, punctuated by hours upon hours of unconscious pacing while she dwelt within that small nook in her mind.

In the absence of sound, her ears had begun to pick up strange scatterings and scramblings, like tiny insects in the corners of the room clicking their tiny feet on the white walls. To keep them at bay, she had begun to hum, and then to sing to herself as she walked. She sang whatever came to mind—national ballads, folk songs, children’s tunes, lullabies.

She finally broke down and showered after meal eight, when her hair hung in lanky, greasy tendrils in her face. She’d stripped down and washed, no longer caring who saw. Nevertheless, the water was barely lukewarm and she finished quickly. She’d had to drip-dry, trying to speed things along by using the flimsy partition as a makeshift towel. It hadn’t helped much, but she refused to use the priest’s cloak—which had lain untouched on the bed since she had awoken the first day. Manually combing her hair with her fingers had given her something to do that didn’t involve retreating inside herself. _That_ was becoming too addictive at the moment.

Her emotionless hours were punctuated with moments of extreme anger. Why had no one come to look for her yet? Were they so incompetent that they couldn’t figure out who kidnapped her? Why had she let herself sleep in an unguarded room, knowing who she was? Why had _they_ let her sleep alone? Did Walter not know any better?! Anger was better than the fear, so she gladly embraced the rage-inducing thoughts, despite the slight guilt that came later at the blame so unjustly given mentally to her poor butler, and even to the ancient vampire and Miss Victoria in some moments.

It was right after meal fifteen that they brought him back. It had been a supper tray—bland roast beef that was tender enough to cut apart with the spoon, undersalted stewed potatoes, corn, a soft roll, pears in syrup and a plastic container of water. She learned quickly that if she stacked the trays neatly on the countertop, when she slept they took them away and she didn’t have to smell old food. She’d just finished stacking her three trays of the “day” and had sat back down on the sofa when it happened.

She’d barely smelled the gas before blacking out, coming to slumped over the arm of the sofa with her neck aching from the bad angle. Instantly she’d been hit with the tang of iron and rust, her nose wrinkling in distaste as she stood and saw a figure lying on the bed. Instantly, all thoughts of insanity fled her at the sight, and for the first time in perhaps _days_ she felt almost normal, having something other than herself to direct her thoughts towards.

It wasn’t a pretty picture—he’d been tortured, that was for sure. She crept over to the bed, where he was staining the cushy nothingness of the mattress with blood. She peered closely at him, satisfied with her deduction that for the moment, he was unconscious. If he’d been awake, it was clear he’d have been in severe pain. She wondered if they had brought him back in such a state to put some fear into her, showing her what might happen to her own body if she didn’t cooperate when it was her turn, whenever that might be.

“I thought you were a Regenerator,” she said softly, looking at him with a scientific eye. She recalled that he’d said there were no meals during interrogation, and thought if perhaps without nourishment he languished and became more like a normal human being. Or perhaps his wounds had been greater than this, and the process was slower than she had been led to believe by her informants in the Vatican.

She felt like she needed to do _something_ , and settled with ripping strips of cloth from the bottom of her nightgown. She gathered a few and the hem traveled from her ankles to her knees. She tore an extra-wide strip, wetting it in the sink and wringing it out before turning back to him with a grim sense of purpose. She didn’t want to play nursemaid, but it beat the hell out of pacing like a madman while he lay there like a corpse. She pushed her sleeves up above her elbows, gritting her teeth as she set to her self-appointed task.

She methodically cleaned the blood from his wounds, gaging their severity and binding the deeper ones with the strips of torn nightgown. She knotted them as best she could and worked her way down slowly, unused to doctoring another person. She thought to herself that when she went back home, she ought to take a few first-aid lessons from Walter. Turning her mind back to her ‘patient’, she noted that his clothes weren’t torn, but the skin beneath them was and she realized with a chill that they’d taken his shirt off at the very least, most likely in order to preserve it for further use.

She shrugged to herself and pulled his shirt up as best she could, staring for a moment at the deep scars on his chest before wrinkling her nose again. He looked like he’d been through the grinder before he’d ever come to this place. The scars were clearly many years old. Her eyes flitted to the gash on his face and wondered where he could have gotten them. It wasn’t likely that she’d ever know. She didn’t even know how old he was.

She ran out of makeshift bandages and decided that anything else would just have to heal on its own. he could wash the blood off himself after he regained strength. If he’d been telling the truth, he’d gone through interrogation at least once before. That meant that he’d recovered before, too. Now that this diversion was finished, she had nothing more to do other than sit down in the chair at the table, her eyes steadily focused on his chest.

Suddenly, she was deathly afraid of the movement ceasing. What would she do if he stopped breathing? If he _died_? Would they leave her in the room with him? She gulped, a hand on her throat as she watched. The slightly insane part of her mind reasoned that as long as she kept watch, he wouldn’t die. So she kept up the vigil, happy for every rasping breath he took.

It was far better than fifteen meal’s worth of silence.


	4. It's Not Crazy If You Can Explain It

            As the meals ( _days_ , one must think of it in terms of _days_ ) passed, Integra began to wonder where the line between unconscious and comatose lay. Anderson neither woke nor stirred; if it hadn’t been for the movement of his chest, he could have easily been freshly dead. _Or a vampire_ , she had thought to herself with a slightly hysterical sense of humor, thinking back on how Alucard and Seras both ceased breathing when they fell asleep.

            There was no stir craziness; she was beyond the point of cabin fever. She had catalogued every miniscule speck of dust on the coffee table, every atom of the sofa, and could have probably told a questioner the exact number of eyelashes on Anderson himself, if she’d been asked. There was nothing to do, which was torture in itself. She was out of options, and her daily pacing only seemed to make her waste away. The only respite was mealtimes, where she could at least look at something new. She found herself staring fondly at pancakes one morning—though if it were truly morning, she didn’t know—until they were cold, only because the sight of their warm brown color against the pale beige of the tray was a wonderful, _exquisite_ contrast to the white infinity of the room she now inhabited.

            There was only ever one tray, and she wondered if they knew Anderson was still unconscious or not. Perhaps there were cameras recording her every movement, though she wasn’t sure where one might hide a camera lens in the cell. Then again, perhaps there was only ever one tray, and she would be expected to halve her daily meals with the priest when he finally awoke… if he awoke. It was also highly possible that they’d only stuck him back in here to die; this was her greatest concern, only because she wasn’t sure what she might do if he up and died on her. She wasn’t sure if she could go back to that awful silence, even though the only sound he made was soft, constant breathing.

            Still, every meal she took a moment to lightly shake him, taking care to keep from opening any of the wounds that still remained. Her hope was that he’d finally open his eyes and show some improvement, though it never happened. His injuries were healing, at a much faster pace than a human’s, but still slow. She’d seen him take a bullet to the skull and get back up again minutes later; to take this long to heal what, to him, should only be minor cuts and bruises was discerning in the least. It only showed that he was much weaker than he had first appeared to be.

            Walter had told her once, when she was a young girl, that people became numb when exposed to horror on a daily basis. Though she hadn’t felt or seen anything too bad—not yet, at least—she still felt a crippling numbness creeping in on her like a tiger, low to the ground and poised to strike the moment she let down her guard. Every day seemed to bring it closer, every _hour_ that she spent locked in a cell that practically glowed with purity and whitewashed horror.

            The last straw was when she awoke and realized, with a sort of helpless bleakness, that she no longer expected Alucard or Seras to come busting through the door. She would have gladly welcomed the Iscariots with open arms at this point, but the truth was settling deep into her breast, thumping in time with her heart. No one was coming for her. It was an awful moment, the most awful, terrible moment in all her meager twenty-plus years of life. If she had been the sort of person that cried, she might have wept at the realization. But as it was, she only stared blankly at the stainless steel of the table and gave a heartfelt sigh. Then, as she rested her head on her hands, something within her stirred; it was something that she hadn’t felt since childhood, about the time when her father died.

            _So we’re giving up then, are we?_ the snide voice spoke up with a harrumph. _Just going to blithely walk into the light like a trained puppy, I see. Not even put up the smallest fight._ The voice sounded suspiciously like Sir Irons, when he was in one of his more lecturing moods. _Aren’t you ashamed to call yourself a Protestant Knight?_ It sneered.

            _If Anderson couldn’t get out, then how can I?_ She glanced under her arm at the still form on the bed, the dried stains of his blood still marring the white mattress-like cover, though the iron odor had long since dispersed with the constantly recycled air.  _If there was any way to power out of this place, he’d have found it by now. He’s not an idiot._

            _Well, **you** bloody well won’t find a way moping about like this. You’re Integra Hellsing, for God’s sake! Get up and get at it! _ She frowned, lifting her head. The same emotion had resonated with her once she had realized her uncle’s true plans for her. To lie down and die like a submissive dog was _not_ the Hellsing way. A true blooded member of her family would die on their own two feet, laughing in the face of Death and carrying as many of the enemy as they could to the afterlife with them.   _If you’re going to die, do it with as much dignity as possible_ , the voice echoed her father’s own words sagely. _Don’t let anyone get the better of you, when all they have are mind tricks and brute strength._

            _I won’t._ Resolve flooded her veins and she took a deep breath, wishing (not for the first time) that she had a cigar. She licked her lips and looked around, but no escape ideas jumped out at her from the well-lit corners of the room. _I have to do something to keep myself occupied, until they come for me. If I could just see something of the outside of this room… would it be worth trying to peek through the slot near the counters? If there **are** cameras here, they might withhold food if they suspect a plot.  _

            “I don’t suppose _you_ have any ideas?” she asked the prone figure on the bed sarcastically. There was no answer, naturally, but it felt good to talk. Her voice was hoarse from disuse, but each word rasping against her vocal chords felt _good_. “I didn’t think so,” she muttered after a long moment. “If Walter were here, he’d tell me to catalogue my assets. I don’t _have_ any,” she growled in frustration. “Everything here is either bolted to the floor or completely useless.”

She got up and tried, for the sake of trying, to yank the chair from the floor. As she thought, it wouldn’t budge an inch. She huffed and walked around the room, this time not with the mind-numbing pacing motions she’d been using, but instead more thoroughly. Her hands ran along the walls again and again, trying to discover some weakness. She rested her ear against the cool whiteness, striving to hear something beyond the plaster and brick. She did the same with the door, but her efforts proved to be in vain. She even tried to somehow tear apart the shower, but the handle was held in place by screws that were nearly impossible to move, and she ended up with two broken fingernails. The shower head was too high for her to reach; standing on her tiptoes and stretching her arm for all it was worth, she could just barely press her fingertips against its base.

She took a break for lunch, which proved to be a simple turkey sandwich meal with one slice of cheese and once leaf of lettuce. She licked the last bit of the day’s dessert—custard— from the spoon and stacked the tray on the counter, an act that was sadly proving to be habitual for her. She wanted nothing about this cell to be habitual—for it to become so meant that she was spending too much time in here.

She took time after lunch to check floors and ceilings. She couldn’t reach the ceilings without standing on the bolted chair, and even then her fingers could barely brush the tile set firmly into the framework. Still, there had to be a way for air to circulate through the room, though the grate wasn’t obvious. _I’m becoming a bit too familiar with air ducts,_ she thought blandly as she searched for the grate. _Still, if it will help me get out of here, I’ll be more than happy to climb into one again._ She did find it, only to realize that the air was coming from small vents built into the framework of the bed. She tried to see into the vent openings, but it was too dark. She could see a bit better when she took her glasses off, her face pushed up against the vent itself, but everything was so blurry without them that it didn’t help in the end.

“If only I could tell that there was a proper duct down there….” she mumbled to herself, sitting up and drawing her knees to her chest. She propped her head on them as she thought over possible ways to break the vents and enlarge the opening. If she could tear apart the bed itself, would there be some way to make a hole large enough to slip through? Could she hide it under the cushion-like mattress, if she could somehow pry it off the bedframe? Of course, if there _were_ cameras, there was no reason to hide it at all.

They’d know exactly what was going on.

* * *

“I keep it easy, the first few times. Of course, some people would claim that it’s not easy a’tall, but I feel that they bring it on themselves.”

She’d woken in a new room, one that she assumed was an interrogation cell. She wondered, not for the first time, how many rooms this compound—prison?—had. There were no tables or chairs in sight here. She was strapped to some sort of operating table, though it felt more like a morgue slab. She wasn’t strapped tightly at all, only enough to restrict her getting up and moving. It was angled up to a half-reclined position instead of being flat on her back, but it still brought to mind 1984 and the horror of Room 101. She inwardly quipped that rats weren’t her greatest fear, so she didn’t need to worry about having the same fate as poor Winston.

The room itself was dimmed, the only bright light being one right above her head. _Very typical, almost as though I were in a police drama of some sort_.  From what she could tell, the room lacked the odd asylum-esque monotony that the others had. The walls were dark, the floor dark, no solid grays and whites here. The edges of the room were blurred, a sign that her glasses were again missing. She supposed that she wouldn’t have any need of them here. Her arms were beginning to fall asleep, the restraints restricting blood flow even as loose as they were. With their lack of feeling came a nagging sense of claustrophobia, as though the room itself were beginning to close in on her. She felt bad for chiding Seras Victoria for her fear of closed spaces, seeing firsthand the strange, panicky heartbeat that came with it. She took a slow, quiet breath, attempting to control her body’s natural reactions to the situation.

She heard a lighter click and a familiar, overpowering scent wafted around her. Immediately her mouth dried and she bit the inside of her lip. Wayne Grady walked around her ‘perch’, taking a deep drag on what she immediately recognized as her preferred brand of cigars. He blew out the smoke, looking at the stick before nodding appreciatively at her.

“That’s good stuff,” he admitted, taking another drag. “Want some?” he asked with a polite smile that seemed a little too smug for her taste. She smiled in return, hoping that he could see every facet of sarcasm and resentment in the gesture.

“No thank you,” she replied civilly, even as her every pore longed for the sweet embrace of the addicting nicotine. “I’m thinking of going off them, actually.” His smirk widened and he shrugged.

“Suit yourself, ma’am.” He stuck the cigar in his mouth and let it dangle from his lips as he looked her over appraisingly. It was a detached sort of observation, as though she were no more than a dissected body lying on the table for examination. He moved closer and she caught the sour smell of beer and, oddly enough, oranges; even with the smoke, it was a nauseating smell that made her want to slap him away.  “I think your hemline’s gotten shorter since we last met,” he noted, reaching out a hand and motioning at the edge of her nightgown. She bit her tongue, determined to play by the rules… until he went one step too far, at least.

“I suppose you’d know about that already, so there’s no need of telling you,” she said as civilly as possible, though her teeth were clenched tight enough to make her jaw ache. The man arched a brow at her, puffing on the cigar as he continued to study her.

“We don’t keep watch,” he said after a moment, looking away. The tone of his sentence was odd enough that it almost seemed like he was changing the subject, rather than addressing her. “Why would we need to? If you can somehow manage to find a way to off yourself even after our precautions, you deserved the honor of dying.”

“What reason do I have to believe you?” she snapped, her tight reins slipping in her growing impatience. He took the cigar between his fingers, looked at it, and then dropped it to the floor, grinding it beneath his boot even though it was only half-smoked.

“What reason do I have to lie to you?” he asked with genuine curiosity. He crossed his arms, tilting his head to stare directly into her face. “I’m holding the ropes here. I’ve got nothing to lose _or_ gain from lying to you. It’s far easier to tell the truth anyway. I don’t watch the prisoners. It’s a waste of time and money. Y’all can’t escape, and if your cellmate gets a little antsy and turns you into his bitch, it ain’t no concern of mine.” He laughed. “Well, _your_ cellmate might not, but I’m sure there’s plenty of other prisoners in this place that end up being bottom for one reason or the other. Hell, they might as well just enjoy one last good fuck before they die anyway!” He laughed louder, as though pleased at his own words. Her jaw tightened even further, back teeth grinding together in an effort to keep quiet.

“What is it that you want from me, that you couldn’t have gotten anywhere except from the source? What do you want with _him_? We’re nothing alike, other than a very thin line that borders our professions. Is it information about vampires that you want? About Alucard?”

“I don’t want nothing,” Grady stated, walking around the table until he was behind her. It set her on edge; she wanted to be able to _see_ him. “It’s what my boss wants. And as for vampires, we’ll come back to that another session. Like I said before, I like to make the first one easy. Think of it as a tutorial course, for what might come.” He walked around to her other side, circling the table like some sort of predatory vulture. “I ask the questions here, Miss Hellsing. And these questions are about the easiest that you’ll get. That way, whatever happens from here on out is up to you.” He stopped in front of her and smiled. “Is your name Integra Fairbrook Wingates Hellsing?”

“Yes,” was her tight-lipped reply. His smug grin widened.

“And tell me, Miss Hellsing: What’s two and two make?”

“This is utterly ridiculous,” she hissed, cheeks burning. “I’m not going to sit here and answer these asinine—” She couldn’t finish the sentence as her entire body lit up in pain, too much for her to even make a sound. Thankfully, it only lasted a brief moment and she felt every muscle in her body relax as the pain vanished as quickly as it had come. Her breath left her in a long exhale, a shudder working up her spine. _What was that?!_

“Mild electrical shock,” Grady answered, as if reading her thoughts. His eyes narrowed. “That’s the lowest setting. Didn’t feel good, did it?” She shook her head slowly, a part of her remembering his words during her ‘orientation’. “The entire apparatus,” he continued, his accent drawing the word out, “is rigged with a current. Every time you give a wrong answer, or no answer at all, you get shocked. And, might I add, that shock treatment is merely the hammer my toolbox.  A staple, for sure, but I have much more advanced ways of making you talk.” He stepped closer to her, his noxious odor surrounding her like a pungent mist. “Never forget that, Miss Hellsing. You won’t be able to die until you talk, no matter how much you beg.”

“I’ll never beg,” she vowed, her voice sounding breathless in the wake of the current.

“I hope not,” he replied. “I hope you obey yourself, and I can let you die in a few months without a problem. I could probably even arrange for a relatively painless death. Something like a firing squad.” He rubbed his chin. “Of course, standard execution is death by Ghouls, but I think I’ll have to find something more creative for you. Ghouls ain’t that scary when you’ve gotten so used to them.” He smiled secretively at her. “It’s so exciting to see a grown man cry when faced with a hungry Hoard. I never get tired of it.” He turned to face her, hands behind his back. “Two and two, Miss Hellsing?”

“Four,” she muttered, feeling ashamed of herself for bending to his will. But, she reasoned, if she could hold off the torture for more pressing questions, she might have a chance of lasting until she could find an escape. No sense wasting suffering on something as simple as her pride.

“Good girl,” he purred, only heightening her mixed anger and humiliation. “Now, let’s put some of these questions to good use, shall we?” He walked away, coming back with a metal chair. He sat backwards in it, resting his arms on the backboard. “When were you born?”

“October of 1977.”

“And your parents?”

“They’re dead.” He nodded as though sympathizing with her.

“When did they die?”

“My mother died when I was born, and my father died in June 1989.” Grady rested his head on his arms.

“Of what?” Integra paused, her pride again warring with her common sense for dominance. _Why should I sit here as if I were filling out some questionnaire?!_ _To stay alive!_ She answered herself. _I have to sit her like some schoolgirl and… stay alive until I can escape. Then I’ll make sure he gets exactly what’s coming to him. I’ll let Alucard tear him limb from limb while **I** ask the questions. _“Of _what_?” he repeated, louder. She felt that the shock was next and roused herself from her thoughts.

“Of AIDS.” Grady sat up at this, eyes widening.

“Oh? How did he catch it?”

“I don’t know.” There was a pause.

“Your mother also had the disease?” She felt discomfort curling up within her breast.

“I don’t know,” she repeated, more quietly.

“Do _you_ —?”

“No.”

“You’ve been tested?” Grady was methodical now, staring intently at her. She felt the hair rise on the back of her neck, wondering if he was asking to be sure that no blood-borne diseases could be transmitted to him during her interrogation.

“Yes, I have.”

“Good,” he responded, nodding. “Good to know.” He leaned his neck to the side, cracking it before resting it on his arms again, a picture of ease. “By your answers, you were about twelve when he died. That left you an orphan, with no family?”

“I was an orphan, but I had an uncle. My father’s brother.”

“Where’s he now?” Integra smiled grimly.

“Dead.”

“Your family seems to succumb to the angel of death rather quickly, I’m afraid.”

“He deserved what he got.” A chuckle.

“Oh? That sounds like a bad memory, Miss Hellsing. What did he ‘get’?”

“A bullet. A parting gift from myself.” A cruel, yet knowing smile crept up the corners of the man’s mouth and wrinkled crow’s feet near his eyes.

“I see. So what was his crime?” His voice dropped a few octaves. “Did he like little girls?” A sound of disgust welled up in her throat, along with a mental relief that that _hadn’t_ been the case.

“Of course not!” she spat. “He wanted the Hellsing title for himself, and the only way to get it was to kill me.”

“I see,” he repeated, looking at the soles of her bare feet. “Hmmm…. And so after that, you were alone.”

“No.” She wasn’t alone, had never been alone. Walter, and the servants, and Alucard, repulsive as he was at times, had always been there. In her life, in her mind, even in her thoughts. And now, with the Police Girl as well….

“No,” he agreed, his voice cryptic and damning. “Well, you aren’t alone now either, with the big guy,” he laughed. She didn’t bother mentioning that he hadn’t woken up. Instead, she asked something that had been on her mind since he’d been thrown back into her cell.

“What did you _do_ to him?” Mr. Grady laughed.

“Ask him yourself, if he ever wakes up. But, little lady—you better be prepared to know the truth.”

 


End file.
